INDIANAPOLIS 500 / UPDATE : Great Expectations Crash for Coyne

Dale Coyne has been chasing a dream at Indianapolis Motor Speedway for nine years. He wanted to make the Indy 500 with a car of his own design, the DC-1, with a Chevrolet stock block engine.

He drove in 34 Indy car races and was rookie of the race in 1985 for both the Michigan and Pocono 500s, but he never made it into the Indy 500. In 1989 he left the cockpit to manage his own racing team. Last year he got rookies Eric Bachelart and Brian Bonner into the race.

This year he arrived with five cars and three drivers--Bachelart and rookies Robbie Buhl and Ross Bentley.

Wednesday, Coyne’s dream became a nightmare.

Bentley was still unable to drive because his hands were heavily bandaged from a freak fire that erupted while he was practicing last week.

Wednesday morning, Bachelart crashed the Marmon Wasp II into the wall in the second turn, extensively damaging the front and right side of the Lola-Buick. He was taken to Methodist Hospital with cuts on his knees and feet.

Less than 30 minutes later, Coyne was watching the television monitor in his garage when he saw Buhl hitting the wall in the second turn. He thought it was a tape of Buhl’s crash last Wednesday that hospitalized him with a concussion.

It wasn’t. The 1992 Indy Lights champion was crashing at the same place he had a week ago.

“It was the worst half-hour of my life,” Coyne said. “From five cars and three drivers, now I have two cars and no drivers.”

All three drivers may be released to drive by Friday. Who gets to attempt to qualify Saturday, Coyne said, will depend on “who is the quickest and healthiest.”

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Emerson Fittipaldi, in a Chevy-powered Penske, posted the second 226-m.p.h. lap of the month when he ran 226.051, a shade under the 226.182 by pole-sitter Arie Luyendyk last week.

“We were working on a new racing setup,” said Fittipaldi, who was disappointed Saturday when he qualified at only 220.150, which put him in the third row.